Put a stop to red-light cameras

Those infamous red-light cameras that have been lighting up drivers for a pile of fines across New Jersey continue to click away, despite many legitimate concerns about their value and their fairness. Supporters continue to tout their safety benefits, but it remains painfully obvious that safety is, at best, an afterthought among municipal officials, a convenient explanation to mask the money grab that is the true motivation behind the cameras.

There shouldn't be any doubts about that anymore, especially not after the revelations about the mistimed lights that had been rigged with shorter-than-required yellow lights to maximize chances of nabbing red-light violators. That prompted a temporary suspension of tickets and a supposed retesting and recalibration of the offending lights, but it didn't derail the program permanently.

Now State Sen. Shirley Turner, D-Mercer - an opponent of the cameras, we should make clear from the outset - has a "solution." She wants to ban right-on-red turns at intersections where the cameras are present. Right-on-red violations when a driver fails to come to a complete stop generate a hefty percentage of the overall ticket revenue from the cameras, and Turner's theory is that by chopping that revenue local officials would give up and eventually ditch the cameras altogether.

We can appreciate Turner's creative attempt to minimize the impact of the cameras - but it's also an entirely counterproductive way to attack the problem. The right-on-red rules exist for a reason; they help with the flow of traffic at intersections where such turns can be made safely. So the state is going to eliminate those turns merely to prevent more tickets from being issued?

The big revenue drop Turner anticipates may materialize in time. But in the short term, many drivers would continue to make the same right-on-red turns that have long been legal, regardless of how many new signs are posted. And at that point all of those turns would be subject to fines. Municipalities may even experience a brief increase in related revenue.

There's also the little matter of unintended consequences. The presumed eventual loss of some right-on-red fines might indeed frustrate local politicos. But the end result may not be eliminating the cameras, but instead adopting new methods of recapturing some of that money, either through bigger fines or more cameras at other locations if the program is expanded.

The cameras are currently operating in 25 towns as part of a five-year pilot program, although an ongoing lawsuit has challenged their use in 16 communities, contending that thousands of drivers are due refunds because of how the cameras have been deployed. We continue to believe the red-light cameras do more harm than good, but we also believe municipal officials enjoying the financial fruits of the cameras will be loathe to declare them anything less than a success - as a safety measure, of course. Legislators should step in and scuttle the pilot program, the sooner the better.

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Put a stop to red-light cameras

Those infamous red-light cameras that have been lighting up drivers for a pile of fines across New Jersey continue to click away, despite many legitimate concerns about their value and their fairness.

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